Lovebirds
by Lamia of the Dark
Summary: Soulmate!AU. When soulmates meet, they each sprout a pair of matching wings. Each chapter will focus on a different pairing, but all take place within the same universe. (Due to the limitations of the character filter, all further pairings will be listed in the summary as their chapters are posted.)
1. Peregrine

**DISCLAIMER: Attack on Titan belongs to Hajime Isayama.**

 **In this AU: when soulmates meet, they sprout matching wings. (Nothing else is different except some changes in military protocol/equipment when dealing with soulmate pairs/winged people.)**

 **Each chapter in this collection will focus on a single pairing. The chapter titles will be the bird that the main pairing's wings look like. All chapters will take place in the same universe/continuity/timeline, so all pairings will remain consistent throughout all the chapters.**

~ Lovebirds ~  
(Peregrine)

At nine years old, Eren hasn't given much thought to soulmates. He knows the stories, of course. Everyone does. When a pair of soulmates first meet each other, they will both sprout a pair of wings. In the little slice of the world that he's seen, Eren hasn't come across any winged people. His parents don't have wings, but they love each other anyway.

When Eren thinks of wings, he is much more likely to be thinking about the Wings of Freedom - the symbol of the Survey Corps - than about romance and soulmates.

* * *

The day he meets Mikasa, the day they save each other's lives, is the first time Eren is really forced to think about what 'getting your wings' means.

On their way back home, he notices that the girl keeps putting her hand over her shoulder to rub at the center of her back.

"Why do you keep doing that?" Eren asks. "Are you hurt?"

"No," Mikasa answers, blushing slightly. "I'm checking to see if my wings started growing yet."

Having overheard the childrens' conversation, Grisha chuckles.

"Oh, if you'd met your soulmate, you'd know it," the doctor says. "It isn't a slow process. The wings appear almost immediately after either eye contact or physical contact between soulmates. Catching each other's gaze is the most common, but the blind also have soulmates, and there are quite a few tales of people literally running into each other, only to have their wings appear..."

"What if you never find them?" Mikasa asks quietly.

"If you never find your soulmate, you can still fall in love with someone and be happy," Grisha answers.

Mikasa's parents were soulmates, and she had been hoping she would find her own soulmate one day, but now that she has met Eren, she wishes desperately that she will never find the destined mate the universe has picked out for her, so that she will be able to spend her life happily at Eren's side.

* * *

Eren is constantly getting in fights with the neighborhood bullies, but Mikasa is always there to protect him now, so he doesn't usually get beaten up too bad. It's been a year since Mikasa came to live with the Jaegers, and she has met pretty much everyone in their town by now. She still doesn't have wings, and neither does Eren.

Today he's slacking off and taking a nap while she gathers all the firewood, but Mikasa doesn't mind. She plans to spend her whole life taking care of Eren.

On their way home, Eren hears that the Survey Corps is returning from an expedition and runs off to watch them before she can stop him.

He waves excitedly at the 'heroes'. The Commander's crystal-blue eyes catch the excited child's gaze before quickly turning away.

The happiness fades from the boy's expression as the procession continues and he sees how few and how injured the returning soldiers really are.

Eren suddenly notices that his back feels strange - itchy and hot. Then Mikasa is grabbing his hand and dragging him away.

Eren flexes his shoulders, trying to make the weird feeling go away, and the firewood goes flying everywhere.

"Huh? What happened...?" he says, nonplussed.

"Eren..." Mikasa makes a frustrated sound and grabs his hand again.

Even though he is normally slow on the uptake, Eren can tell that something strange is going on. Mikasa seems rather intent on taking him back home right now, so much so that she isn't even going to bother to pick up his half of the firewood.

He turns his head to look back over his shoulder, as if the spilled firewood itself will provide some kind of answer. It isn't until he looks back and sees them that he realizes _he has wings_.

But that would mean his soulmate is-

* * *

 _Some kid from the slums of Shiganshina, really?_ Erwin directs the thought spitefully toward the Wall Goddesses, or whatever other force of fate decides who a person's soulmate is.

And why did he have to find his soulmate _now_ , of all times, when he had just recently been promoted to Commander of the Survey Corps? He wouldn't be able to go back out in the field again until after he trained with the alternate maneuver gear that had been designed for those with flight-capable wings.

The wings feel heavy against his back. He's already taken off the upper part of his maneuver gear harness to keep the newly-grown appendages from being mangled under it. Even though he still has his cloak on over them, it isn't enough to disguise the fact that he has encountered his soulmate. He dreads flight training almost more than he dreads having to report his soul-mated condition to his superiors.

He doesn't question why his soulmate is male. He has never been physically attracted to anyone of either gender. He supposes it doesn't matter either way, since he doesn't intend to have any type of relationship with his soulmate at all. He hopes he will never see him again.

* * *

If he keeps his wings folded tightly against his back, they appear to be a solid dark brown. The feathers on the undersides of the wings are striped with white.

Erwin avoids showing the undersides of his wings whenever flight is not strictly necessary. Those in the Survey Corps who have returned from missions with him are the only living humans who have seen what the inside of his wings look like. It's a distinctive pattern, and he doesn't want anyone to find out who his soulmate is.

More than he fears for the child's safety if their bond were publicly known, he does not want to have another responsibility forced upon him.

* * *

The boy is reckless and idealistic, and not fit to be a soldier if Erwin has anything to say about it.

The boy can turn into a Titan. The government sees his value as a weapon, but is also afraid of his powers.

He agrees to let Levi watch over the boy. That will have to be enough, because he has nothing else to offer.

Erwin is a terrible soulmate, but it seems that nothing he does can convince Eren to dislike him. And, he thinks, perhaps _that_ is the reason they were paired together.

~oOo~


	2. Scarlet Macaw

~ Lovebirds ~  
(Scarlet Macaw)

There is always a bit of chaos in the first few days of training when the fresh meat comes in. Every year, without fail, at least one soulmate pair will find each other on the training field, or in the barracks, or - Wall Goddesses forbid - in the _showers_. These events are always a pain for Keith, and not just because it means he has to give 'the talk' to a pair of blushing twelve-year-olds. The affected trainees' quarters, training regiments, uniforms, and maneuver gear all have to be reassigned whenever a soulmate pair find each other.

The maneuver gear was originally designed for humans without wings, but alternatives had been developed that would allow winged soldiers to also use it. For those whose wings are too small to allow flight, there is an alternate upper-body harness which would allow them to use the gear without risk of injuring their wings. For those who are capable of flight, there is an entirely different set of gear.

It comes as no surprise that several soulmate pairs find each other on the first day of training every year, and several more in the subsequent week. There are protocols in place for the newly-discovered soulmate pairs to be moved to the 'winged' side of the training camp as quickly and smoothly as possible. Unless they specifically request to be placed in the communal barracks for winged persons, soulmates are quartered together in a private room. In the eyes of the law, the soulmate bond is considered a form of marriage. In fact, it is considered a higher form that trumps traditional marriages - which effectively means that if someone who is married to a person who is not their soulmate _does_ find their soulmate, the previous marriage will be rendered null and void by the soulmate bond.

* * *

With a sound that is oddly reminiscent of a fart, the wings tear through the back of Keith's coat.

There is a moment of dead silence, followed by an uproar of laughter. He doesn't know if the trainees are laughing because the girl he was just yelling at has turned out to be his soulmate, or because the recruits are a bunch of immature twelve-year-olds that still laugh at anything that sounds like flatulence, or because their wings look _fucking stupid_. The backs of the wings are a trio of bright, clownish colors - red, yellow, blue - while the undersides are fully red.

Keith doesn't know what to do. There is no precedent for this particular situation, and therefore no protocol exists for dealing with it.

So he stands there staring like a dumbass at the little food-thief who is apparently his soulmate, until one of the Military Police officers who is responsible for escorting soulmate pairs to the other training ground takes pity on him and comes over to drag him off out of the crowd.

"You come too," the MP says.

A moment later Keith feels a tug on his sleeve and looks down to see his soulmate walking beside him, clinging to his arm with one hand. She notices him looking at her and smiles up at him.

"It's Sasha," she says suddenly.

"What...?" he replies, nonplussed.

"My name," she says. "You asked before-" She makes a flapping gesture with her free hand which he assumes is supposed to mean their wings appearing. "-and I didn't answer."

* * *

She seems to just automatically trust him, because _that's what soulmates are supposed to do_. She is so open and unguarded with him that it brings out every protective male instinct that he'd never before realized he possesses.

Normally when an experienced member of the military finds their soulmate (usually either a civilian or an experienced soldier themself), they are given a crash-course in using the alternate gear and sent right back out into the field, but since his soulmate is a new recruit, he is offered the option of going through the entire three years of training with her so that they won't have to be separated.

"We can stay together!" Sasha squeals, beaming up at him, upon receiving this news. And just like that, his decision is made.

The rest of the day is spent getting settled: being fitted for new uniforms, trading in their old 3DMG for the alternate 'flight-capable winged person' maneuver gear, moving their possessions into their new quarters, and even a trip into the nearby civilian town to replace the casual clothing that they will no longer be able to wear due their wings. Sasha spends a majority of this time clinging to Keith's arm, and on the rare occasions that she does let go, he finds himself reaching out to take her hand and draw her back to his side.

He doesn't know what he's doing. He has been in love before, but this... this protective feeling, this anxiety over his soulmate's safety and well-being is completely new to him.

The second time she pulls away from him in the middle of the crowded marketplace, he scowls down at her as he admonishes, "Don't wander off. What if you get lost?"

"I'm sorry," Sasha says, sounding guilty. Her saddened expression makes his heart clench.

"It's... alright," he says, slow and uncertain. "Just stay... with me."

Are those the right words in this situation? He doesn't even know how to begin trying to reassure someone. It's kind of pathetic...

He ruffles her hair with his free hand and she perks up.

"What were you so excited to see, anyway?" he asks.

"Oh! They're selling sewing kits over there. I was thinking that if I had one, I could alter our old clothes so that we could still wear them. It would be a shame to just get rid of them, after all..."

Their Military Police escort grumbles as another package is added to the pile in his arms, "Stupid superiors, telling me this assignment would be 'pretty much just a chance to stand around and slack off'. The lying jerks."

* * *

It's been a long day and they've finally reached the end of it. Keith gratefully collapses onto his bed, facedown, wings tightly folded against his back. He starts to drift off almost immediately, but a racket from the other side of the room snaps him out of his near-slumber.

Feathers rustle, boards creak, limbs thump against the wall or floor...

"How am I supposed to sleep?" Sasha wails.

"Fold your wings. Lie on your side or your stomach," he mumbles into his pillow.

"I can't sleep with them folded!" she protests.

"Then sleep with them open..."

"The bed's too narrow! I'm gonna fall off!"

It is a testament to how upset she is that she allows her accent to slip a bit.

Keith sighs and shifts onto his side.

"Come here," he says.

She comes over, hesitating for only a moment before climbing into bed beside him. He wraps his arm around her waist, careful to leave a few inches of space between their bodies.

"There," he says tiredly. "I won't let you fall off. Now go to sleep."

He feels a slight tug on the front of his nightshirt as her fingers clutch the fabric, but other than that she doesn't move to close the small distance between them.

The darkness hides her happy grin from him, but he can practically hear it in her voice as she whispers, "Goodnight."

~oOo~


End file.
